In the Name of Progress
by Faded-Reflections
Summary: "Help me overthrow the Tallest." Five words was all it took to get Luc's attention, as he could only stare at the irken in front of him in disbelief. "You can't be serious. T-that's completely insane to even think ab-" A laugh silenced him. "No sane person has ever done anything memorable." SYOC story. 7/11 slots left.


**(A/N: Hey guys! This my first (cough*notreally*cough) story... Not counting a few other stories I've since deleted, hah. Anyways, this is gonna be a mostly, if not entirely, OC centered story. For the first part, at least. Yup, you heard right. If anyone in this tiny fandom likes my story, I plan on making this thing a 3 part series. The 2nd and 3rd parts will have a LOT more canon involvement, if that's your thing. Anyways... Here's the thing.)**

The smeetery was filled with the clockwork, routine buzz of machinery. The soft whirs and clanks of gears turning, of mechanic joints twisting, was the lullaby that filled the dreams of the alien spawn incubating within their tubes. Their barely formed limbs would twitch and stir with the automated heartbeat of their robotic matron, small clawed feet and hands grasping for some sort of embrace. All that they were met with, of course, was the liquid-filled tube in which they incubated. In a way, the emerald fluid they all floated in was much like a hug. Warm and all-encompassing, gently soothing the tiny smeets in their growing slumber.

This is where the similarities ended, of course. For these infants, being mass-produced and churned out by the thousands, there was no true, individual comfort. This point in their lives, in fact, would be the most comfortable they'd ever be. All were destined for the same fate, like countless others before them. Be born, serve the Armada, die. All irkens knew this as fact, regardless of their social standing. However, most did not regard this with contempt. After all, what other life was there? For most of recorded history, the system had always been in place. There was no irken alive that could remember anything different.

For some, their service would be far more grand than others. These privileged few would be generals and soldiers, some even conquering entire solar systems or becoming leaders. Their names and experiences would forever be stored in a grand database, one which all irkens would learn and take their knowledge from. In a sense, they would become truly immortal.

Yet for most of these smeets, their lives were to be filled with no such grandeur. Their meaningless and short existences would be spent scrubbing floors and serving food, forever hunched under the scrutinizing gaze of their superiors. After their deaths at the hands of exhaustion or being tossed from an airlock, they would be forgotten. Their memories, thoughts' and emotions were classified as junk, before being completely wiped. To the control brains, they were worthless. No one would remember or mourn them. A new smeet would be assigned their pak, and the miserable cycle would simply continue all over again. The Irken Empire had been founded on routine and conformity. Not to mention height.

A sudden beep alerted the machinery that one of the tubes was ready. The normally frowning, blue colored face at the end of the tube had turned a smiling green, as one of the robot arms reached down to unscrew it. As it withdrew the cylinder from its hole, the alien creature could clearly be seen within. A tiny, pale green body floated in the now sloshing verdant liquid. Its black antenna were folded against its skull, eyes closed in an almost lifeless slumber. Another robotic limb grasped the other end of the tube, and working in unison with its partner, snapped it in half. Both fluid and smeet came out, the later hitting the floor with a moist, meaty plop.

Cracked glass and a puddle of green surrounded the tiny, vulnerable thing. It did not stir, and seemed to lay dead on the metallic floor. The thing wasn't even breathing. This wasn't the end of this tiny creature's story, however. Yet another automated arm reached down, and with a spiked tip, drilled two holes in the smeet's back. A clearish, pink-tinged fluid soon welled from the wounds, before a second machine quickly stuck a pak on top of them. The small disc of metal wired itself to the smeet, cybernetic tentacles wrapping themselves around the spine, granting a permanent access to the young irken's brain. The last and final machine reached down from the ceiling, before delivering a powerful shock to the poor thing's body.

There was no reaction.

This was not a common thing with smeets. The robot was confused for a brief moment, as it had not failed to activate a smeet in a long time. In doubt, it simply relied on shocking the alien spawn again, but with a much higher voltage this time. If this didn't work, the tiny corpse would simply be sent down the waste chute. There were thousands just like it, and the loss of one would not be missed. In response to the shock, the newborn writhed and twitched, before abruptly standing up in a salute. Ah, back on schedule. What the machine failed to notice, however, was the thin curl of black smoke coming from the smeet's pak. It was not built to sustain such a high voltage, and had undoubtably been permanently damaged as a result. The robot dismissed any error, before greeting the irken in a monotone voice.

"Welcome to life, irken child. Report for duty."

 **(A/N: Woohoo, first chapter! Little short, but eh. Review and favorite if you like it, leave hate if you don't, I guess. Whatever floats your boat. Anyway, you guys remember what I said about a LOT of OCs in this? Welllll, I might need a few, hence the nifty SYOC tag on the summary. PLEASE don't send in your OCs via review' though. PM them to me, please. I mostly need soldiers and elites, along with other military jobs BESIDES invader. I'll take one or two, but not 100 of them. Okay, form time!)**

 **Name:**

 **Age:**

 **Gender:**

 **Species:**

 **Assignment/Job:**

 **History:**

 **Personality:**

 **Appearance:**

 **Sexuality:**

 **Are you okay with your OC being paired up?:**

 **On that subject, are you okay with them dying?:**


End file.
